“Kraven The Hunter” was directed by J.C. Chandor, based on the Marvel comic book character & is the 6th and final film in Sony’s Spider Man Universe which included 2024’s “Madam Web”, 2022’s “Morbius” & the 3 “Venom” films with Tom Hardy. This film stars Aaron Taylor – Johnson, Ariana DeBose, Fred Hechinger, Alessandro Nivola, Christopher Abbott & Russell Crowe. The film was scheduled to come out in late 2023 but after several delays, it was pushed to December 13th, 2024.
In this film, a young boy is attacked by a lion in Ghana and later found by a witch doctor & her daughter. He is given a special serum that gives him animalistic traits & characteristics such as super strength, increased sensibility & catlike reflexes. 20 years later, the boy, now a grown man, Sergi (Taylor – Johnson) who works as a bounty hunter, catching high level criminals & known terrorists throughout Asia & Europe. Sergi goes to London to join his brother, Dmitri (Hechinger) for his birthday. They are also joined by their father, Nikolai (Crowe) who has a strained relationship with Sergi after the lion attack as well as his mother’s death. During the reunion, a group of masked mercenaries attack & kidnapped Dmitri. Sergi begins tracking the mercenaries which leads him to a scientist by the name of Alekesi Sytsevich (Nivloa) who vows to destroy Nikolai’s criminal empire by making an example of his own son. Sergi will stop at nothing to save his brother & kill all who stand in his way.
This film felt like a step in the right direction with a “R” rating but due to the delay, it took a lot of the hype & excitement from the film. Aaron Taylor – Johnson was great as the titular character. While his look was a bit off, his performance was top notch. The problem with film was the rest of the film. Too many villains, bad pacing, lack of direction or depth of any other characters & just an overall waste of a film that didn’t connect on any level or to any other film in this failure of a cinematic universe. None the villain in this film had any characterizations at all. In my personal opinion, this was a petty move by Sony to not just give “Spider Man” & ALL his villains to Disney & Marvel cause with the exception of the first “Venom” film, none of the films were good or linked to each other outside of the comic book counter parts. This separate cinematic universe didn’t have any legs to stand on by the time “Kraven” hit theaters. I’m not sure if it’s a good thing or bad thing but, this film is supposedly the final film in this universe. If it is? I’m just glad it’s finally over cause after “Morbius” was a huge disappointment, I said that Sony should stop making comic book films. They failed with Sam Raimi’s 3rd “Spider Man” film, they failed with both of Andrew Garfield’s “Amazing Spider Man” films & then failed 5 more times now with this separate universe bringing the grand total to 8 film flops.
Overall, this film had no chance to revive this failing universe & was going to ultimately suffer despite having small moments of enjoyment. Aaron Taylor – Johnson did the character justice but the rest of the film did not. While JC Chandor & Aaron Taylor – Johnson have expressed interest in a sequel & possible crossover project but unfortunately those ideas were tossed out the window when this film bombed at the box office. Sony already stated that all future film projects surrounding this universe have cancelled while their upcoming “Spider Noir” series is set to release some time this year, starring Nicholas Cage.
Nice one